


A Very Strange Day

by krakens



Category: Lizzie Bennet Diaries
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-21
Updated: 2013-02-21
Packaged: 2017-11-30 00:04:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,083
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/693057
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/krakens/pseuds/krakens
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Some days are a mixed bag. Maybe you find a twenty on the sidewalk but you also get a parking ticket. Or maybe your best friend's boss's boss calls you up out of the blue to call you a tramp but then you make out with her hot nephew.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Very Strange Day

Lizzie sleeps in until three in the afternoon the Monday after everything’s over. She feels like she deserves it.

When she comes downstairs to find something to eat, Lydia is in the kitchen. Her sister stares at her expectantly.

“What?” Lizzie asks as she opens the fridge.

“Why are you still here?” Lydia asks.

“What?” she asks again, although her tone is now genuinely inquisitive instead of defensive.

“What are you doing here?”

“Getting breakfast?” Lydia doesn’t seem satisfied with this answer. “Lunch?” Lizzie tries again.

“What are you still doing _in town_ ,” Lydia pushes, her tone surprisingly no-nonsense.

“Uh, you asked me to stay,” Lizzie says. She can’t say Lydia’s turnaround on this topic is surprising, exactly, but it is slightly worrying.

“That was before I found out you only have a _week_ left on your independent study,” Lydia says. Lizzie slams the fridge shut with a little more force than she intends to. She can’t even make herself care that Lydia knows this when she really shouldn’t. She’s gotten used to the idea of her little sister having an elaborate network of spies or something.

“I’m not going back to San Francisco,” Lizzie says.

“Why?”

“Because,” Lizzie says.

“That’s not a reason,” Lydia points out.

“Because…” She rustles through the pantry. “Because I want to be here with you.”

“I promise I can live without you for _one_   _week_ ,” Lydia says. “Jane’s home. Go back to San Francisco.”

“I  _can’t_ , Lydia.”

“Why?” she asks. When Lizzie doesn’t respond, Lydia pushes and asks again. “Why?”

Lizzie pulls box of cereal down from a pantry shelf, picks up a bowl and spoon from the dishwasher rack, which is pulled out but not unloaded, and retrieves the milk from the fridge. She’s pouring the cereal when she responds.

“I already told Darcy I was leaving,” she says quietly, setting the cereal box down. Lydia’s eyebrows knit together, and she opens her mouth to say something, but then thinks better of it. Lizzie pours her milk and then moves to put it away. While she’s putting the cereal back in the pantry, her back turned to her sister, Lydia speaks, her voice a furtive whisper.

“Do you like him?”

Lizzie looks over her shoulder. It’s nice to see her up to her usual mischief, it’s nice to see her smiling deviously again. But the topic of Darcy is too loaded and too sensitive and altogether too related to the topic of George Wickham that Lizzie just can’t engage.

“Why do you ask?” she asks with a noncommittal shrug.

“ _Please_ ,” Lydia says, sounding like her old self for a monosyllable. “I saw the video.”

As Lizzie contemplates her cornflakes, she can’t quite ask Lydia which video she’s talking about.

But she doesn’t really need to. They’re all pretty incriminating.

* * *

After Jane gets caught up on Lizzie’s videos, she wants to talk about what happened at Pemberley Digital, because of course she does.

She interrupts Lizzie when she’s shooting her next video (Lizzie is fairly certain that she actually waited for her to turn the camera on before ambushing her) and presses her with little questions about her time there.

Lizzie answers them as quickly and gracefully as she possibly can, but the more she reflects on Pemberley Digital the more she feels a hollow gnawing in the pit of her stomach. She’s been avoiding it as much as she can, but all this focus on it, and her, and her feelings has woken it up again.

Jane notices she is ill-at-ease and stops teasing her about it, but her concern turns out to be so much worse than the good-natured ribbing.

* * *

As the days pass, Lydia grows more and more like her old self, which Lizzie is grateful for.

This also means that as the days pass, Lydia gets less subtle about the Darcy situation, which… not so much.

The Friday after everything is over, Lydia goes to the internet for help in persuading Lizzie to return to her studies in San Francisco. Lizzie’s been actively avoiding her fans since everything went down, but Lydia has no trouble finding fanart drawings of Lizzie and Darcy together in spades. She prints them out and leaves them around the house in increasingly obvious locations.

When Lizzie begs her to stop, Lydia feigns innocence.

Part of her is afraid that one of her parents will find one of the drawings, but most of her is just humiliated. The entire situation is so humiliating. There’s no other word for it. Everything she’s said and done on her videos in the last year, everything she’s made him do. How willingly he participated in it all. She’d thought, because he’d done that, he might still care for her. Now she thinks she must’ve been wrong.

Her father finds one of the drawings in the living room on Saturday and calls Lizzie into his office. At first, she’s terrified that he’s changed his mind about only watching her first ten videos. The alternative, she quickly discovers, is much worse.

“Lizzie,” he says, sounding as if he’s just recovered from a fit of laughter. He waves the drawing in her face. “Have you seen this? How people think up these things, I’ll never know.” He hands her the paper with a sparkle in his eye, as if he’s sharing a joke with her.

Her stomach clenches unpleasantly as she really considers the drawing for the first time. It’s of her and Darcy, sitting in her bedroom as it looked a month ago, framed as if they’re speaking to the camera. It’s excellently done, and it makes her miss everything: the days when things were as simple as turning on her camera and saying her piece, not always questioning herself, her bookcase and her room the way it used to be. Even him.

Not for the first time since she’s returned home, she feels the ache behind her sternum deepen. Instinctively, she knows that it’s becoming something more than just nostalgia.

“You’re not laughing,” her father says. She bites back a sarcastic reply.

“It’s funny,” she manages. “I’m just sick of all this.”

Mr. Bennet nods pensively. “It must be difficult, having people tell you that you should love somebody you hate.”

Lizzie tries to remember the last time she really, honestly hated Darcy, but she can’t. Even last Halloween, she’d been so scared that he’d watch her videos and… what had it been, exactly? She’d professed to wanting to strangle him only minutes before, so why had she been so anxious that he was going to see her calling him a douchebag at length? What had she really had to lose? She doesn’t know. She, again, misses the time when she never would have asked herself these questions.

“Well, I meant it as a joke, but I can see you’re upset by it,” Mr. Bennet continues. “And that’s the very last thing in the world I want.”

Lizzie smiles at him weakly. “I better go find the rest of these before mom does,” she says, motioning to the drawing still in her hand.

She throws most of them away. Against her better judgment, she folds that one up and slips it into her pocket.

* * *

 Lydia drops in while she’s filming Monday’s video. Even though it’s only been a week since her little sister swore off on-camera antics, Lizzie doesn’t question it. She’s been indulging Lydia in all of her whims recently. She hopes that it’s helping at least a little bit and that Lydia isn’t just hiding behind another mask.

“What are you talking about?” Lydia asks as she plops down next to her.

“Grad school stuff,” Lizzie says.

“Ugh. Boring.”

“Nobody is forcing you to be here,” Lizzie mutters. She knows Lydia’s right. Her audience has never been really interested in her graduate thesis or her independent study. But her academic career is at a crossroads right now and it’s stressing her out nearly as much as everything else is, so she wants to talk about it for five minutes, damn it.

“You are, with your suckitude. I’m here to help you out.” She looks directly at the camera as she suggests “Talk about Darcy.”

“You seriously want me to talk about Darcy?” Lizzie asks, vaguely flabbergasted. She would have expected this from Jane or Charlotte. Never Lydia.

“Look,” Lydia says with a surprisingly sage sigh. “The last time I remember you really _liking_ someone was, like, when I was still in high school.” Lizzie bites her tongue and glances at the camera, with its little red blinking light taunting her. “It’s not a bad thing to having feelings, Lizzie. If you guys like each other you should talk about it.”

“We don’t,” Lizzie begins, before starting over. “I don’t like him.” Even though Lydia has leveled this accusation at her a few times over the last week, it’s the first time she’s denied it. “ _You_ don’t like him, and you’re my sister, so that’s what’s really important.”

Lydia’s lips fall open but she doesn’t say anything for a moment. She makes a little whining noise, and then finally says “He’s not so bad.”

Lizzie stares at her.

“When did you come to this conclusion?” Lizzie asks, feeling kind of mechanical. Lydia shrugs, and glances up at the door to the hallway, clearly thinking about just making a break for it. “ _Lydia_ ,” Lizzie hisses.

“Okay,” Lydia says, holding her hands. “I’ll tell you. First you have to tell me why you won’t go back to San Francisco though. Fair trade?” She holds out her hand for Lizzie to shake.

“I asked first.”

“Too bad,” Lydia says, raising her eyebrows.

“Fine,” Lizzie says as she shakes Lydia’s hand. She inhales a deep breath and wonders if she should turn the camera off. “So, after my last video there, I went down to the car that Darcy called for me, and he went down with me, and he asked me again if there was anything else he could do to help. And I was just so nervous and anxious and he was being so…” She can’t think of a word, so she just moves on. “Anyway, I told him I didn’t want his help, and I didn’t want to owe him anything, and I kind of… yelled about it?” She screws her face up.

Lydia stares at her, her expression between disbelief and exasperation.

“It wasn’t my finest moment,” Lizzie elaborates.

“That’s it?”

“Yeah,” Lizzie says sheepishly.

“Geez,” Lydia says, exhaling like a weight has been lifted off her shoulders. “Okay. Well, I don’t feel bad about this anymore.”

Lizzie raises her eyebrows.

“Darcy took the website down. He tracked down… he did everything. It was him. He made me promise not to tell you, but… I thought he had a better reason than thinking you’d be mad at him. I would’ve told you sooner if I’d known.”

Lizzie stares at her for a long moment and then shoves her shoulder.

“Hey!” Lydia exclaims. Lizzie pushes her again.

“Why didn’t you _tell me that_ before I posted all those videos?” Lizzie has to admit she can hear her voice taking on a hysteric tone. She wonders if Darcy has been watching her videos since she left. If he saw her thanking him all those times.

“I promised and he’s scary,” Lydia whines, pushing her back. Lizzie takes a deep breath and calms down and remembers the camera is on, ignoring everything else that is rushing through her mind.

“Oh, I can’t post this,” she says, staring straight at the camera.

“What? You have to,” Lydia says.

“I,” Lizzie says without really knowing what she wanted to say.

“You know he’s still watching, Lizzie, you have to post it.”

“If he’s watching them, why wouldn’t he… get in touch? I just don’t think it’s a good idea, Lydia. Besides, you promised.”

“Please, Lizzie?” Lydia asks, clasping her hands together. “Please?”

Lizzie can’t say no to her. Not right now.

“Fine,” she says, reaching over to switch the camera off and on again. “But we’re rerecording the last half of this.”

* * *

 She posts the video on Monday. She watches it four times through first, follows the logic of the conversation – her original one with Lydia up until her recap of events at Pemberley Digital, a new improvised ending where Lydia mentions rewatching the videos and revising her opinion, some brief discussion of regret. She worries someone will notice that for the last two minutes of it they are play-acting, that there is something not quite genuine about it. She wonders if the script they come up with is too oblique, if they should have been more direct about things. She tells herself that all of these are the reasons her heart is beating in her throat. Those reasons, and nothing else.

* * *

 The next Thursday is a very strange day.

Bing finally calls Jane late Wednesday night. They talk for ages, well into the morning hours. Lydia and Lizzie sit in her room, across from the fish tank, with their ears pressed to the wall shared with Jane’s room, but they can only make out every couple words. Eventually they give up and fall asleep curled up on Lizzie’s bed together.

Jane wakes them up at five AM to tell them all about it. She’s so happy and sunshiney that Lizzie can’t even be annoyed with her.

“He apologized for everything,” Jane says. “He really meant it. He did.”

“What happened?” Lizzie asks, scooting over to make room for her on the bed. They sit side-by-side on Lizzie’s double bed, their feet hanging off the side.

“He thought I didn’t care about him,” Jane says. “He thought I’d been seeing other people. Caroline said… well.”

Lizzie doesn’t press it.

“And he wanted to get in touch with me, but she talked him out of it. She said that I’d never care about him as much as he cared about me, and that it was best for him to just move on. I know I should be angry,” Jane laughs to herself as she speaks. “But I thought he didn’t care about me, too, and I’m just so happy that we were both wrong.”

Lydia glances at Lizzie, side-long. She doesn’t say anything, but the way her lips are pursed speaks volumes.

“I’m really happy for you, Jane,” Lizzie says. Lydia agrees, and then all hug, half-curled up on one bed like they used to do when they were children.

* * *

 Lizzie gets another scant hour of sleep before she receives a frantic text from Charlotte.

_911\. Skype me._

Lizzie rolls over and presses a hand to her eyes before she texts back.

_Now?_

_Yes, now._ Charlotte’s reply comes almost immediately, so Lizzie reaches over the side of her bed and picks up her laptop and props herself up so she can video-chat with Charlotte. She hasn’t even gotten enough sleep to feel groggy, but her entire face hurts.

“What is it?” she asks as soon as she has Charlotte on the line.

“Catherine de Bourgh is going to call you,” Charlotte says. Lizzie sits bolt upright.

“ _Why_?” she says very loudly. She hears Jane rouse in the next room and drops her voice. “Why? What does she want?”

“I don’t know, Lizzie,” Charlotte says in an exasperated tone. “Mr. Collins texted me just now to say that we’re not going to have dinner with her tonight because she’s going to call you and she’s in a _state_ about it.”

“Well that sounds fun.” Lizzie can’t process what’s going on anymore, so she doesn’t even try.

“Lizzie?” Jane asks from her doorway. “Is everything alright?”

She shakes her head at Jane, turning her attention back to Charlotte.

“When’s she going to call?”

“Seven thirty.”

“ _Why?”_

“Her day starts at five sharp,” Charlotte says, sounding like she’s quoting her directly. “Seven thirty’s her ten.”

She really has nothing further to say on the topic than _ugh_. “Ugh,” she says. She checks the time. It’s seven fourteen. “Well, thanks for the warning, I guess,” she says. Charlotte wishes her luck.

Lizzie throws back her bedcovers and pulls herself out of bed.

* * *

 Lizzie’s phone rings exactly sixteen minutes later. She, Jane, and Lydia have relocated to downstairs, where they sit around the kitchen table in their pajamas.

As it buzzes on the table, they all stare at it. It rings three times before Lizzie takes a deep breath and picks it up.

“Hello?”

“Liz,” Catherine’s voice comes from the other end of the line, as grating as it’s ever been. “It’s Catherine de Bourgh. I got your number from Collins. I think it’s important that we have a little chat.” Lizzie doesn’t get a chance to speak before she barrels on. “I hope you’re not busy.”

Lizzie gets out a strangled response to that. “No, I’m not… busy.” Jane gives her a thumbs up, so she assumes it sounded at least somewhat polite.

“Good. I’m sure you know what I’ve called to speak to you about.”

“Actually, I have no idea,” Lizzie says.

“Liz,” Catherine prompts. Lizzie wishes de Bourgh could see the way she’s raising her eyebrows.

“I really don’t,” Lizzie says, her voice thick with impatience.

“Let’s just cut to the chase,” de Bourgh says.

“Please,” Lizzie snips. She can’t help it.

“I’ve heard that your sister has gotten in touch with Mr. Lee and while I can’t say I approve there’s really nothing I can do about that. However, I don’t want you involved with my nephew.”

“I’m… what?” Lizzie asks, her mood snapping from annoyed to extremely confused in seconds. Lydia, who has been leaning her ear towards Lizzie’s phone to listen in, relays this development to a confused Jane.

“Now I know what I’ve heard can’t be true, but it really would be an _unfortunate_ association for him to have.”

“If you’re so sure it’s not true, why are you even calling me?” Lizzie asks, her free hand clenching into a fist. She wants to hang up. She doesn’t want to be having this conversation anymore.

“Well, I want to hear it from you, Liz.”

“How is that even remotely any of your business?” Lizzie asks. By this point, her head feels fuzzy, and her body is coursing with adrenaline. She barely feels like she’s inside her own skin anymore.

“My nephew’s business is my business,” de Bourgh continues. “And while I’ve always liked you and wish the best for you and your career, you just do not have the kind of reputation I’d want from a young woman who was marrying into my family.”

“What _reputation_?”

“You can’t think people haven’t been talking about you and your sisters,” de Bourg says. Lizzie clenches and unclenches her fist. “You least of all, I’ll admit, but your older sister’s infidelity is well known.” Lizzie grits her teeth as de Bourgh continues. “And most reprehensible at all are your younger sister’s recent ventures. Yes, I know all about that. The idea of that girl a member of _my_ family, or you or other sister, quite honestly, is unthinkable. I will not have—”

Lizzie hangs up the phone.

Lydia and Jane gape at her for a moment. She throws her hands up in frustration. “She was being _rude_!” Lizzie shouts. She remembers that her mother is still asleep upstairs and schools her volume. “I’m not going to sit here and listen to that.”

The phone buzzes on the table.

“She’s calling back,” Jane points out quietly. Lizzie doesn’t move to answer it.

“Lizzie, you have to pick up,” Lydia says. “It’s like those letters from Harry Potter, it’s only going to get worse the longer you don’t answer it.” Lizzie is so incensed that she can’t even be bothered to call Lydia a nerd for this reference.

“I’m not talking to her again.”

“Don’t you want to know why she thinks she has to scare you off Darcy in the first place?” Lydia asks, pulling her knees up to her chin. The phone buzzes a fifth time. Lizzie looks between her sisters for a second before picking the phone up.

“ _What now_ ,” she spits into the receiver.

“Liz, I’m not done with you yet. You still haven’t promised me—”

“And I’m not _going to_ ,” Lizzie says. “Look, you might think you have a hand in Darcy’s business, but even if that was true, and I don’t think it is, you sure as hell don’t have any right to order me around. And you don’t know anything about me if you think you can scare me into doing what you want. I’m not going to promise you anything. If you want to make sure Darcy’s never going to be _involved_ with me, maybe you should make _him_ promise.”

De Bourgh is silent on the other end of the line.

“Now if you’re done insulting me, I have better things to do. And by the way,” she says, feeling emboldened by her tirade. “My name is _Lizzie_.”

She hangs the phone up again.

De Bourgh does not call back again.

* * *

 After the phone call, Lizzie retreats to the den immediately and turns on her camera. She records a five minute rant about de Bourgh. She doesn’t really think of the repercussions of sharing this story with the internet. She doesn’t even edit the video, beyond splicing in her theme song. She uploads it and posts it just over the wire at 9:23AM, much to the discontent of her impatient fans.

* * *

 Jane and Lydia take her out to breakfast. Even though she’s gotten all of three hours of sleep she can’t calm down enough to even think about going to bed. So they all pile into Jane’s car and go to Denny’s and order pancakes and waffles and smoothies and coffee.

They do not talk about the phone call, or Darcy. They talk about Bing for a little while, and Jane mentions that he’s flying in to see her later today, and that he’s going to meet her at Carter’s later tonight. She asks Lizzie and Lydia to come.

“I don’t know,” Lizzie says, running a hand through her hair.

“I haven’t been to Carter’s in forever,” Lydia mentions, leaning back in her seat. “It might be fun. I mean, it’d be funner if it was a girls’ night, but I guess I can hang out with Bing too.”

“I don’t think it’s a good idea,” Lizzie continues.

“C’mon,” Lydia says. “I could use something to take my mind off of everything. I’ll even play Just Dance with you.”

Lizzie still can’t bring herself to say no to Lydia.

* * *

 After they get home from their breakfast junkfood extravaganza, Lizzie tries to take a nap. She ends up lying awake in her bed, ruminating on the day’s events.

She does not like the places her mind wanders to when she lets down her guard.

When she decides she won’t be able to get any sleep, Lizzie gets up and gets on her computer. She wants to call Charlotte, but she has an email in her inbox from her already. Apparently the entire senior staff of Collins & Collins has gone on a company retreat – an actual one that will take them out of Hunsford for two weeks.

Lizzie can’t say she blames them.

She showers and gets dressed and finds her sisters and her mother in the living room, all looking edgy.

“What’s going on?” she asks.

“Bing got in early and mom wants to talk to him,” Jane says quietly with a small smile that belies how nervous she is. “He should be here any minute now…”

Right on cue, Lizzie hears a car pull up in front of the house. Lydia bounds over to the window like a puppy, peering out from behind the blinds. Her eyes widen in shock and she looks back at Lizzie. Two car doors slam shut outside.

“Who is it?” Lizzie asks quietly.

Lydia doesn’t have time to respond before the doorbell rings, but Lizzie knows. She wonders if it’s too late to just hide.

Instead, she retreats across the living room and positions herself behind Jane and Lydia.

Bing and Darcy come in and some very awkward small talk is made between Bing and Mrs. Bennet. Lizzie feels bad for Jane, that the first time she’s seen Bing in months has to be like this, but the two of them look happy enough that this doesn’t preoccupy her thoughts for long.

She glances at Darcy. He’s looking at her, but they both look away immediately when she makes eye contact. When she looks at him again, he’s staring at his shoes.

“Are you coming out with us tonight, Darcy?” Jane asks. He clears his throat twice before respond.

“No,” he says, looking up at Jane. As long as he’s not looking at her, Lizzie can’t keep her eyes off his face. “I’m not staying in town. I’m just, ah, passing through.”

“Oh, that’s too bad,” Jane says. “You should stay for tonight, come out with us.”

“Yeah,” Bing says, the dorkiest grin ever plastered across his face. “Come on, Darcy.”

Darcy looks at his feet again and mumbles something that might be an affirmation.

After a little more slightly less awkward catch-up, Bing leaves and Darcy goes with him, having not said a single word to her or even looked her directly in the eye.

* * *

 Lizzie doesn’t go with Jane to Carter’s, even on her insistence. After she decides that she’s not going, Lydia decides she doesn’t want to be third wheels with Darcy all night and stays home too.

An hour later, Jane texts Lizzie that Darcy is thinking about going home and that she should really come over.

Lydia reads the text after Lizzie acquiesces and lets her. “Are you going?” she asks.

“No,” Lizzie sighs. “He doesn’t want to talk to me. I don’t want to bug him.”

“Lizzie,” Lydia says, taking on her no nonsense tone. “I have never gotten a straight answer from you on this. Do you like him?”

Lizzie’s entire mouth is dry and her lips stick together. “Yes,” she says, finally. And her heart is pounding against her chest, and she’s scared out of her mind and doesn’t know why, but it’s good to say it out loud. “I do. I really like him. I…” She doesn’t say what she was about to, but she holds it in her mind.

“Then what are you still doing here, dummy?” Lydia asks.

Lizzie grabs her keys off the kitchen table and doesn’t mind the door on the way out.

* * *

 She runs into him in the parking lot. He’s walking to his car as she’s walking to the bar. They stand there, in the parking lot, staring at each other at twenty paces.

“Lizzie,” he says, taking a step forward.

“Hi,” she says. She’s rooted in place.

“Bing and Jane are inside,” he says, taking another few steps towards her.

“I came to see you,” she says. He stops in place.

“Oh?”

“Yeah,” she says. This time she takes a step forward. They’re comfortable talking distance now; not as close as they’d stand to each other in her later days at Pemberley Digital, but the distance of acquaintances. She wants to take another step, to be closer, but she doesn’t dare. “I wanted to talk to you. I haven’t really had a chance…”

“No,” he agrees, jamming his hands in his pockets. He leans his weight forward onto his toes for a second. She swallows. “What… what did you want to talk about?” he asks.

“I wanted to thank you,” she says. “For what you did for Lydia.” He blinks in surprise. “She told me,” she says quietly.

“Oh,” he says, and then recoups his composure. “You’re welcome. Although, you don’t have to… you shouldn’t feel the need to…” He sighs, frustrated. “I did it as much for myself as I did for you,” he says. “You don’t need to thank me.”

“I wanted to,” she says.

“Okay,” he says, under his breath. They stand in silence for a moment and Lizzie wonders if she should leave. “I saw your video this morning,” he says, catching her by surprise.

“You did?” she asks.

“I did.” He shuffles forward, but only an inch or two. “I didn’t mean for… I asked her not to do that.”

“Well,” Lizzie says, lifting her arms up in a half-hearted gesture before letting them fall back to her sides.

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be,” she says.

“No,” Darcy says. “You deserve your privacy. You deserve to be left alone. You won’t hear from her again.”

Lizzie knows she should feel relieved, but the words pool cold in the pit of her stomach. She wraps her arms around herself. “And what about you?” she hears herself asking. “After you leave town tomorrow, am I never going to hear from you again?”

“If that’s what you want,” he says, his voice tight.

“It’s not,” she says before she can stop herself. His head snaps up, but in the dim yellow light of the parking lot streetlamps, she can’t make out the expression on his face. “I don’t want that.”

“Lizzie,” he says in a low tone of warning.

“I’m in love with you,” she says, plain and simple. She knows that it isn’t really fair of her, that the time has passed. But as soon as she says it out loud she knows also that it was something she had to do. If she’d never said it, she wouldn’t have ever been able to move on from it. Now, even though she feels miserable, she can hope she’ll get past this eventually.

He doesn’t say anything for a long moment and she wonders what this must have been like for him, back in October. When he’d made his confession to her, he’d expected a favorable response. She wonders what it would have been like to say those words and expected so much instead of so little.

It’s been long enough and he hasn’t said anything yet so she takes a step backwards, holding her hands up in apology. She tries to say something but she feels choked.

“Lizzie,” he says again with a marked change in his tone. “Lizzie, you’re not cruel. You wouldn’t joke about this.” She shakes her head no, hardly even breathes as he steps towards her again, and again, and again. “You’re not joking?”

“God, no,” Lizzie whispers. They’re only two paces apart now, and she can see his face better. She closes the distance between them, so that she is close enough that she could reach out and touch his face. She takes a shaky breath. “Do you still…”

“Yes,” he says. She opens her mouth to speak again, but she doesn’t have anything left to say. He lifts his hand to her face, but does not actually touch her. Tentatively she covers his hand with her own, leans her cheek into his palm. They both lean forward and she meets his lips halfway.

And for everything that has been messy and imprecise about their relationship, there is nothing complicated about this.

* * *

 She drags Jane into the ladies’ room at Carter’s and tells her immediately. She doesn’t worry about telling Lydia yet and especially does not think about telling her parents yet. Those are problems for her future self.

Because she’s been editing and omitting details when she tells Jane about the last couple months of her life, she has to play a little catch-up. She does it with as much savior faire as she can manage, and she probably makes it sound like the most romantic parking lot kiss ever because Jane squeals in delight.

“Yay!” Jane says, clapping her hands together briefly. “Lizzie!”

She hugs her and they stand for a very long time, just hugging in a bar bathroom.

“I didn’t even think it was possible to be this happy,” she hears Jane say. She hugs her back a little tighter, buries her nose in her hair, and agrees.

* * *

 They rejoin Bing and Darcy and get a booth and sit and drink and talk like old friends who don’t have a year of tumultuous history behind them. It’s nice.

It’s even nicer when Jane and Bing go off to play pinball (not a euphemism) and she scoots around the booth seat to lean against Darcy’s shoulder.

She rests her hand on his leg and he picks it up in his own, running his thumb over the planes of the back of her hand.

“So you’re still watching my videos, huh?” she asks. He laughs nervously, low in the back of his throat, and she feels it reverberate through his chest.

“I wasn’t… going to, but Gigi is… very insistent.” This time, she laughs. “But it worked out in the end. I’m not sure I would have come along with Bing if not for your video this morning.”

“Well, I’ll have to thank her. And your aunt.”

“I will as well,” he says, smirking. They lapse into silence for a while, but for once it isn’t tense or awkward.

“I’m surprised you kept watching my videos at all, after…” she says after a moment.

“Logically, I knew I should stop,” he says.

“I think it’s been awhile since either of us have been behaving rationally,” she points out.

“Well,” he starts again. “At least I haven’t rewatched any of the newer episodes.” He realizes something halfway through the last word and his voice drops off before he actually finishes saying it. She looks up at him.

“Did you rewatch some of the earlier…?” She makes the same realization he did partway through her sentence, and pulls a face as he frowns. “Oh, no,” she says, hiding her face behind her hands. The look on his face confirms what she’s thinking. “Oh _no_. Why would you do that?” She’s laughing but she’s honestly kind of mortified.

“I don’t know,” he says, honestly. “There was just something about what you said that stuck with me, and I couldn’t get it out of my mind. I remember, you said, thank you for proving time and time again that—”

“Stoooop quoting me,” she bemoans, shoving him in the shoulder. She can feel herself blushing furiously and is afraid he can see it too, because he smiles again. His smile is really cute, she thinks to herself (and not just because of the two drinks she’s had tonight).

“Anyway,” he says, “I thought of it so often and I knew it was there. It was hard not to watch.”

“I get that, actually,” she says, thinking back to the envelope still hidden away in her bedroom, with its well-worn and creased pages tucked inside. “I’ve read your letter a hundred times.”

“Do you still have it?”

“Yes,” she admits. “I have it basically memorized.”

“Speaking of things that should go unquoted…” he mumbles. She leans her head on his shoulder again.

“Well, we can burn the letter. And after I get my degree, we can take the videos down too.”

“No,” he says. “It’s alright.”

She looks up at him.

“Even when I thought there was nothing in the future for us,” he says, brushing a lock of hair out of her face. “I never regretted any of it. I wished, sometimes, that it had… turned out differently,” he interrupts himself with a smile. “But I didn’t regret it, because I knew I was a better person for having known you.”

She’s lucky she can string together a coherent thought to reply to this, but she manages to get out what she considers to be a fairly smooth “Well now you can continue knowing me.”

Okay, maybe not all that smooth.

It works on him, though, if the way he catches her under the chin to incline her mouth up to his is any indication.

As she kisses him again, she reflects that “bar booth” is not that much better than “bar parking lot” and makes a mental note to make sure their next kiss is somewhere a little more romantic. Or at the very least a little less attached to a bar. Then she remembers seven thirty this morning and wonders at the fact that she went from feeling so hopeless to making plans for third kisses with William Darcy. She laughs against his lips.

“What?” he asks, drawing back by the smallest degree.

“Nothing,” she says, opening her eyes. “I’m just having a really good day.”


End file.
